Victoria Kroll

Globally, 1.3 million people die on the roads every year as the result of road traffic accidents. These numbers are not falling – in the UK alone there have been 1,800 deaths per year for the past decade, with each fatality costing £2 million.

“The economic and human cost is huge,” says transport psychologist Victoria Kroll. “There is a global need for evidence-based road safety interventions that need to be shown to work.”

Esitu Solutions creates driver assessment and training tools using high-definition video footage of real driving situations and computer-generated imagery to present drivers with dangerous situations via computer simulations and VR headsets.

So far, Victoria’s work shows signs of making a real difference. “Our assessment tests identify those drivers who are more at risk of a collision, while our training tools improve their skills and reduce their crash-likelihood.”

The Innovate UK Women in Innovation Award will help Esitu to reach even more drivers. “The Award will allow us to go that extra step and target the larger and more compliance-led segment of the driver training market. By capturing more of the market, we can have a bigger impact on road safety.”

To Victoria, winning the Award feels like a recognition of all the hard work that has gone into setting up Esitu Solutions. She says, ”I want to demonstrate that you can be both a mother and have a successful career.”